1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to cutting devices and more particularly to a high speed cutting belt for cutting various aggregate and non-aggregate, natural stone and composite building materials having steel or non-steel reinforcing.
2. Prior Art
Cutting concrete, stone, and other hard, brittle materials is a grinding or abrading action rather than a peeling action as in chip removal of a soft ductile material. Typically such materials are cut with cutting segments composed of a metal matrix with hard, abrasion resistant particles such as industrial diamonds randomly distributed therein. The segments are attached to a cutting tool such as the periphery of a circular blade, chain links, or a steel cable. Most commonly used are the circular blade and the chain.
The circular blade is driven by a shaft through the blade center with an arbor flange securing the blade to the shaft. A major disadvantage is that the blade has to be approximately three times larger than the desired depth of cut. A combination of the cost of a large blade and the cost of a large power head required to drive such a blade makes the equipment very expensive. Another disadvantage with a circular saw is that cutting out square corners is not possible without using another tool or cutting past the desired intersection point. The chain saw, by comparison, can cut the same depth of cut as a circular saw with a fraction of the power and can also make square corners without cutting past the desired intersection point.
Several problems exist with the saw chain that are not present for the circular saw. The saw chain involves several parts sliding against each other. The side links and center links pivot relative to each other on rivets, the bottom surface of the side links slides on the guide bar rails, and the center drive tang slides in the guide bar groove. When cutting hard, brittle material, the fine particles that are produced from the cutting operation get between the sliding parts of the saw chain links and the guide bar and acts as an abrasive, wearing the hardest of steel surfaces. The additional clearance between the rivets and the links increases the center-to-center distance between the drive tangs. This causes inefficiencies and additional wear on the drive sprocket due to the change in pitch diameter of the chain. It also inconveniences the operator to frequently adjust the tension of the chain and it ultimately stretches the chain beyond the adjustable limits of the saw.
Another problem is that the saw chain traveling in the saw kerf can wear the rivet heads, causing an increase in power to pull the chain through the kerf and posing a safety issue.
It is desirable that a saw chain for cutting hard, brittle material be better adapted to withstand the abrasion present in such cutting environments. The subject of the present invention provides these and other advantages.
A previous attempt to address these issues, U.S. Pat. No. 5,735,259, was a cutting belt in which the cutting segments were brazed atop of a flat stainless steel tensile member, or brazed onto anchors with either a single loop of wire rope tensile member with both ends permanently joined running through it, or a double wire rope continuous loop tensile member running through it, or a wire rope tensile member with multiple winds that were not mechanically joined.
There were several problems with the prior belt maintaining the alignment of the segments, maintaining the relative distance between the segments and the rapid fatigue of the tensile member.
A high speed cutting belt has not been successfully developed prior to this invention to withstand the extreme abuse that is encountered when cutting hard, brittle material.